Kane followed the predicted route with his eyes. His attention was caught by a manmade arrangement at the back of the beach: a clearing within the jagged rocks that contained a handful of chalky white headstones. As Kane got closer, he saw it was a cemetery, the stones small and narrow like steles. The names on them had mostly worn away, with only a few still sharp enough to read. Henry Garland Harrison, Assistant Surgeon, HMS Viper . . . Kane wondered what Henry Garland Harrison must have thought as he lay dying here. Then he heard a car approaching.

It appeared slowly, a white Buick Enclave, tinted windows. He was in clear view; there was no point in hiding. He stood among the graves waiting as the gleaming SUV stopped above the beach.

All four doors opened at once. A man stepped out, then a woman, then two kids. One of them was Connor.

The boy pointed at Kane.

“That’s him.”

The man waved.

“Hey.”

A girl of five or six moved from Connor to her father and took his hand. The man had reflector shades on a cord around his neck, silvering hair tied back in a ponytail. The mother was taller and slightly younger.

Kane walked up to the road. Connor had shades on but you could see butterfly stitches where his face had been cut. His foot had been rebandaged by someone who knew what they were doing. He wore sandals but still balanced on one foot with a hand on the car door.

“You’re the guy who helped Connor last night,” the man said.

“That’s right. Is he okay?”

“Thanks to you. I’m Thomas,” the father said. The man shook Kane’s hand vigorously. The woman smiled before also shaking his hand.

“Anne.”

“I’m Edward. Pleased to meet you.”

Both wore vests and shorts that showed lean, suntanned bodies. The man could have been anything up to sixty, the woman in her late forties.

“We owe you some thanks,” she said.

“Not at all.”

“I think we do.”

Kane sensed a mixture of emotions behind the family’s stares—not just gratitude but residual anger, a measure of fear, a degree of understandable curiosity. Kane imagined the story of the previous night as it might have been recounted.

“This little monster’s Carina.” Thomas ruffled the girl’s hair. “And Connor you’ve met.”

Carina squinted up at Kane; she looked like her mother, even with the same toughness in her stare. The boy looked like none of them. Dressed in a black T-shirt and cutoff jeans, with the shades on—a shadow in the sunlight of the smiling family.

“Connor wanted to say something too.”

“I really appreciate it,” Connor said.

“How are you doing?”

“Okay.”

“How’s the knee?”

“Fine.”

“Told you it wasn’t broken.”